I was talking to my friend and FI Blogfather, JL Collins recently and he made a thoughtful point. We were talking about money and happiness and he told me that it’s silly that people think they’ll become happier when they get money:
Money will solve money problems. It won’t fix anything else that may be going wrong in your life.
Silly me. I thought that money would make me happier. Then I got the money and while life was better, I felt pretty much the same. But shed no tears because I believe money can work wonders! The presence of money in a bank account won’t result in long-term happiness, but you can use the money to purchase things and/or experiences that can increase happiness.
Creating happiness with stuff is tough. Buying an object may give you a temporary lift, but then the novelty fades and life is the same. One exception is an object that increases fun interactions with other humans. Examples include a second home that you use to spend time with friends and family, a pool that becomes a neighborhood gathering spot, or even a car that you take to meetups where you become fast friends with other gearheads.
Creating happiness with experiences is easier. Novelty is important for happiness and this comes built in with experiences like travel (the favorite in the FI community). But it doesn’t all have to be about fun in new destinations.
Earlier this year, I decided that I needed to work on myself. In April, I attended a personal development course.
Work On Yourself
One of the secondary effects of financial independence is that lots of emotions that were buried under time at work make their way to the surface. With more time, you have more time to think. With more time to think, you quickly realize that everything may not be as wonderful as you thought it was. You learn a lot about yourself quickly.
This is a great side effect. Buried issues are not healthy. They’ll manifest themselves whether you want them to or not, many times in unhealthy ways if you’re denying them. The best way to deal with your shit is to acknowledge and confront it.
I noticed that I was spending too much time ruminating on my past and living in the future. Without a job and a lot of time to take long walks, a lot of stuff came bubbling to the surface. I wasn’t happy. The thoughts weren’t healthy. It was time to do something about it.
I had heard of the Hoffman Process from a podcast. My skeptical mind dismissed it as a woo woo retreat that rich hippies attend to talk about their feelings. Not for me.
Then a good friend mentioned it and how beneficial it was to her. I queried other friends and surprisingly, others had been to it as well. These were good friends that I have known for years. It seems that one of the unwritten rules about the Hoffman Process is that you don’t voluntarily talk about it. But when asked, everyone mentioned how great it was for them. I’m deeply skeptical and love science, so I did some research. Information about the program is scarce, but from what I could tell, it seemed like Hoffman was legit. No magical crystals or other ridiculousness. So, I signed up.
My session ended one week ago today. So how did it go?
It was tough. Most waking hours are consumed with activity. Some of it was exhausting; both emotionally and physically. No phones or internet or information from the outside world.
Almost every night, I had horrible nightmares (apparently this is common). By the end of the week, I was exhausted, both physically and mentally.
I may write more about it soon. In the meantime, if you’re curious, y’all are welcome to contact me over email (mr1500 @ 1500days.com). Or just leave a comment. One thing I won’t do is discuss the details of the activities. I didn’t learn much ahead of time and I had a better experience as a result.
So how do I feel now?
Friends who attended Hoffman sounded like they had been launched out of a cannon. A type of rebirth. A changed human in 7 days.
Me, not so much. But it was good. Very good. I have been able to find closure on a couple of things that have haunted me for years. I’m good, done. No need to revisit those things with anger or a victim attitude. Now, I can look back with gratitude. I’ve made my peace. For this alone, Hoffman was worth it.
And I’m happier in daily life as well. I’m calmer, more confident, and everything just seems a little brighter. It’s like the filter with which I view the world has shifted. Again, Hoffman would have been worth it for this alone.
But I still feel myself slipping into patterns I don’t like. It will take work; lots of work. I’ll need to pay attention to myself and work on my bad patterns in all of my waking hours. It could take months, but will probably take years. It’s hard to teach an old brain new tricks.
But, I’m optimistic and in a happy place. What more could I want?
You
I find it weird that this blog has kinda morphed into something else. Originally, I’d yap about stuff like savings rates and compound interest. That’s fine, but when you get down to it, money is important, but boring and not that complicated. Working on yourself; becoming a satisfied human who finds joy every day; now that’s something. It’s far more interesting and not easy. Every human is different, so it’s up to each of us to figure ourselves out.
If you struggle with your past or yourself, don’t wait to get help. I could have and should have worked on myself sooner. You don’t have to go to California and meditate on top of a hill like I did. Find someone local.
Is there anything more important than becoming the purest, most authentic version of You? I think not. Get on it.
More 1500 Days!!!
You can also find me (and the dinosaurs) at:
Mile High FI podcast:
MindyOnMoney podcast!
Also here:
- Facebook: Facebook group and page
- YouTube: My channel is mostly devoted to home improvement, but I have some other material coming up soon too.
- Instagram: Pretty pictures of dinosaurs, sunsets, and nail guns!
- Twitter: Spontaneous, often insane, ramblings
- Coworking space: On the surface, MMM HQ is a coworking space. Look a little deeper and you’ll see that we’re really building community. The members of MMM HQ are some of the finest people I know
- Buying a Tesla? Use my referral code to get some perks!
Good for you man. The best part is the work never ends.
Thanks! I hope our paths cross again soon.
Thanks for sharing this Carl, it’s so important to work on ourselves, and your being vulnerable and sharing with us that you took the time out to take the higher road and work through your feelings is validating to those who neglect their self-care or mental health. We don’t share our feelings and thoughts enough, and that’s what friends are for too.
Side note, you were so close to Sacramento, let me know next time you come out!
Happy for you Carl, and look forward to hearing more about the impact to you!
Thanks Roger! Hope to see you again soon.
I have found it very interesting and informative how many FI blogs morph into money/psychology/life satisfaction blogs. I noticed the same trend in MMM and some of the mad fientist content especially and that has been super informative to me even as I am in the accumulation phase. I have been trying to take all your lessons to heart as a result.
Thank you for sharing the journey and lessons and I’ll keep coming back for more!
Thanks Alec for the kind words!
We all have a soundtrack playing in the back of our mind. The A side is our greatest hits and the B side our biggest misses.
Of course we always have the B playing. If we just listened to the A side more it would make life so much easier. We would even make more room for exploring new music. But the b side holds us back and is tough to let go. We play it over and over for years
Good job at trying to find room for new music and on trying to put the b side away
That’s a great way to put it.
I think half (maybe more?) is to realize when the B side is playing and deal with it.
Carl, inspiring work to take the time to continue to do the hard work that really matters. Loved reading about the journey and looking forward to seeing you in a couple of weeks!
Thanks Elliot! Go Cardinals! Wait, I’m from Chicago! Don’t judge!
I believe the first thing money buys is peace of mind, as you don’t have to constantly worry about survival: food, shelter, and clothing. Not worrying about how I was going to pay rent every month freed my mind and gave me a sense of calm.
Your post made me think that too much money may have the opposite effect. My mother always told me that “idle hands were the devil’s plaything.” Perhaps an idle brain isn’t much better. When you no longer have to worry about anything, the mind can wander to destructive places. Perhaps the day-to-day obligations of work and the mental taxation of striving for more may somehow protect us.
However, FI(RE) giveth and can taketh away. I’m glad you have the time and resources to work on yourself. I haven’t completed the RE part yet, so my brain is still chock full of work and business. Thanks for the reminder that preparation for retirement isn’t all X’s and O’s. We must also be ready for the mental game.
“When you no longer have to worry about anything, the mind can wander to destructive places.”
Yeah, but long-term, I think it’s a positive. Those destructive places/ memories/ tendencies were already there, but now they’re introducing themselves instead of being buried undo stuff. I know I’m a better person for confronting it all.
Agreed. I was just pointing out that keeping yourself busy tends to suppress those thoughts. It definitely doesn’t fix the underlying issues, though. When you have (or make) the time to slow down, they can bubble to the surface. Most of us would be better off with a little more introspection, but too much ruminating can also be unhealthy. Sounds like you have found a healthy mix and have taken action. Congrats and keep up the good work. We are ALL works in progress!
I love how the blog has been changing over the years. I 100% agree that the money stuff gets boring after one has found the optimal set up.
I have been reading for years, but this post made me write for the first time. I think you are a cool person and it is more interesting to read what you think and how you think than which is the best savings account.
J. Gómez
J! Very kind words and I appreciate them. Ping me when you make it to Colorado!
Very interesting. Glad you made the time for this endeavor. How was Stinson Beach? I have been thinking of visiting there.
Stinson Beach is small, but beautiful. I’ll definitely be back again.
I’m so close to the exhausting and elusive FI where peak happiness exists and now you drop this bombshell about some internal work stuff required to achieve true happiness and the race to happiness was never even about FI. All I have to say is really? C’MON MAN!
Haha! You’re probably not as messed up as me, so don’t worry about it! 🙂 And if you are messed up, FI will give you the time to sort out your shit! It’s good either way!
I’m just giving you the business. We all need inner work. People are complicated. Thanks for having the courage of sharing your story. I’ve never heard of the Hoffman Process before seems interesting.
Hi Carl,
Thank you for being open and posting about your experience. This is very intriguing. I remember your conversation with DM when she opened up and shared her take on Hoffman process.
I have had lot of child/ early adulthood trauma. I had tried different things to be flush out things out of my system. Sometimes it felt great for few months. But the trauma caught me again at the roundabout when I came in contact with people related to my trauma.
I would definitely like to hear your experience on a podcast conversation with Doug.
Thank you.
Life is full of ups and downs. I think it’s great that you’re trying to be happier.
We have to enjoy life while we can. Time is short.
Thank you!
Money buys therapy! And when you find the right therapist, you can actually improve your health, so that one area of spending has spurred one of the biggest improvements in my life in the past 20 years: identifying old patterns that were survival / coping strategies of a child that became unhealthy habits into adulthood. It’s going to be a long process rewriting those patterns but well worth it. Glad for you!
Revanche recently posted…Contemplating the costs of divorce
So I’m curious… Now several years later are you happy that you’ve quit your job and are you enjoying RE or is it something you are questioning? The reason I ask is today is the day I was planning to resign but something is holding me back. I’m scared of leaving my career behind as I feel I may regret it later. And while I’ve hit my FI goal, I worry I may find I don’t have enough. Thoughts?
I’m incredibly happy that I left! I’m a much better example of myself now that I have time to work on myself physically and mentally. I just had no bandwidth before.
Real estate: We have one rental and the only reason we hold it is because we’ll move into it when we downsize houses in a couple of years. I’m not going to jump into another real estate adventure that I’ll have to actively manage or work on, but we still do private lending and have two syndication deals that haven’t closed yet.
But back to your original question. The only way I’d go back to a full-time job is if I was going to starve otherwise!
Hi Carl,
I’m looking forward to the day when I leave the prison bars of my office to just go do what I want to do. Thank you for giving me this realistic expectation of what a post-FI life looks like. Who knew? Perhaps for now the ‘bars’ are keeping me sane.
Your article made me think of the saying, ‘more money more problems’. The richest guy in the Old Testament, Solomon, with all the wives and dollars that he had, got to a point where we talked about life being meaningless.
I’m a follower of Jesus Christ, and know that only He has the power to give me – anyone who asks- the peace to endure this great, and awful, life.
FI or no FI I have hope that one day I will be “supremely happy”.
Still praying for and working towards FI, though.
Post FI life is great! I’m so happy that I have the time to work on myself, both physically and emotionally. I don’t know where I’d be if I was still at work, but I know life wouldn’t be as good as it is now.
nteresting perspective! I agree that while money can solve many problems, it’s not a cure-all. It’s crucial to find a balance and focus on building a fulfilling life beyond finances. Thanks for sharing these insights!